A New Revival

Last night, Julie and I went to hear a speaker at our church. He is a well known evangelist in the Assembly of God denomination and had delivered an impactful sermon earlier that morning. We both had the idea of going to hear him again in the evening service. Well........we heard him. No disrespect to the speaker, but it was the same type of "revival sermon" we grew up hearing. I was disappointed. The first 30-40 minutes seemed like a not so great stand up routine followed by 2 solo song performances, by himself. Then there was the sermon or lack there of.

I do not want to sound like I am bashing merely critiquing what I heard. The message was not any different than what I was used to growing up hearing the preacher state we need a new revival, a fresh tough. We need to see miracles again. His scripture that he had lined up was good and could have expounded a very thought provoking and challenging sermon. But it was another get caught up in the emotional train ride to get "pumped up." The kicker was hearing him say at the end of the sermon his soapbox on how our president does not get any credit from the "liberal" news media for the good things he does. Mainly not allowing partial birth abortions. The other was saying that today is worse fighting the war on terror. He went as far to say that it makes Adolf Hitler seem like a Sunday School picnic. WHAT? We better stop that train right here. Without going into a whole diatribe of rebuts I will disagree, just a tad...o.k. a whole lot, with that statement.

The disappointing part of the whole evening was that we did not feel connected to anything in the service except for the worship in the beginning. I want to continue to feel and hear of relationship with God that is long lasting; that is about intimacy; that is about a life's journey; about community. However, I did take a few nuggets away from the service. It was more self introspection and reflection on my own relationship with God. And I would probably go back, if I had the time, mainly for more communion with God and fellowship with the other parishioners.